Fyne Audio F702SP

Those of us who witnessed the hatching of the Scottish speaker brand Fyne Audio in 2017 had high expectations. It takes more than hope and good wishes to build a successful brand, but the fledgling began life with an in-built advantage – its founding directors and key staff had previously worked at Tannoy and other established audio companies.

Even so, the rapid pace at which Fyne Audio extended its portfolio from an initial eight stereo models to an astonishing 33 today has left more than a few industry watchers scratching their heads. It is almost as if the company has been making up for lost time. Some have wondered whether such a strategy is sustainable, whether by offering such a large number of products, the company might be spreading itself too thinly.

Stick to the plan

Call it chutzpah or hubris, but Fyne Audio has stuck to the plan and is now launching two further models, SP or Special Production versions of its established F702 and F703 floorstanders. Adding the initials SP to existing speaker models is a tune Fyne Audio has played before across several of its ranges.

The smaller of the two new speakers, the F702SP, costs £12,000, £3,000 more than the regular F702. The extra buys components that are effectively straight from the company’s flagship F1 Series of speakers; better drivers, a cryo-ed crossover with higher quality components, Neotech wiring and a different plinth assembly. The changes add seven kilogrammes, bringing weight per cabinet to 37.5kg. 

Polar view

The review sample F702SPs were finished in a white piano lacquer. Alternatives are piano black, piano walnut and satin walnut. If subjective sonic performance is something of a contested area, aesthetic judgements are an absolute minefield. Fyne Audio admits the rather unconventional appearance of its F1 flagship series of speakers tends to polarise opinions and says the two F700SPs are a response that aims to deliver F1-type performance in a more conventional and, therefore, more broadly appealing package. They have succeeded, at least from a visual standpoint; at a little over a metre high and 30cm wide, the F702SP with its two 20.3cm (8 inch) drivers is conventional enough to be reassuring, but different enough to be interesting. 

The 15mm-thick sides and top of the pressed high-density birch-ply cabinets are curved to the rear so that the baffle (18mm thick) and the very much narrower rear panel are the only parallel surfaces. It’s a design strategy that helps discourage the formation of standing waves. Internal baffles and bracing provide stiffening of the cabinet walls but there is minimal use of damping material. Fyne Audio is one of several speaker manufacturers preferring to work primarily with the strength and native frequency response of plywood.

At the base of the rear panel of the F720SP are two sets of WBT binding posts, together with a small knurled screw terminal for users who wish to include the speakers in a system grounding scheme. Jumpers made from Neotech cable are provided.

Where’s the tweeter?

Those unfamiliar with the Fyne Audio shtick might glance at the two-and-a-half-way F702SPs and wonder where the tweeter is. The answer is: where a phase plug might otherwise be, in the centre of the upper of the two drivers. The tweeter is not a conventional direct radiator driver, but a magnesium-dome compression driver that fires through a horn concentric with the surrounding multi-fibre cone of the mid-range driver. Fyne Audio calls this arrangement IsoFlare, and in the F702SP, it results in a pairing of drivers that behaves as a point source from its cross-over with the woofer at 250Hz to beyond 30kHz. 

The mid-range driver has shallow depressions or flutes pressed into its circumference that Fyne Audio says reduces incident travelling energy and coloration. The lower driver features identical flutes, has a phase plug at its centre, and is loaded by a double chamber with a bottom-firing port. The port opening is centred over a tractrix cone on the upper surface of the plinth, dispersing bass energy through 360 degrees. The two-tier plinth on the F702SP is a beefier affair than the standard F702; thicker milled aluminium and chunkier feet housings add mass, stability and a look that speaks of quality. The provided Allen driver adjusts black-coated steel cone feet and cups from above. The F702SP presents amplifiers with a nominally eight Ohm load and has a claimed efficiency of 92dB. Some might be tempted to try single-ended triode amplification, although Fyne Audio suggests a 30-watt minimum is required and a maximum of 200.

Let’s talk about evolution

Today’s Fyne F700 series bears a striking superficial resemblance to Tannoy’s Definition 700 floorstander of 1993. Fyne Audio’s design head, Dr Paul Mills, seems to have been refining the basic design of this speaker for some time. By the way, that observation should not be taken as a criticism. It’s possible to point to several current speaker models from other manufacturers whose lineage can be traced back just as far.

When I evaluated an early production pair of the standard F702 in December 2019 I expressed reservations about its sonic refinement and a visible cabinet seam beneath the gloss finish. Later, the larger F703 delivered much more satisfactory sound quality but exhibited the same cabinet finish flaw – not a huge deal, but surprising nonetheless. Fyne Audio’s head of sales, Max Maud, says the early cabinet quality issues have long been sorted. Certainly, the construction and finish of the review samples bore out this claim, proving to be flawless on close top-to-toe examination. The F702SPs caused no tooth-sucking from a sonic perspective either. Immediate listening impressions – senses naturally on high alert for misbehaviour – were that evident attention to detail in voicing has resulted in a properly competitive level of sonic sophistication.

The F702SPs were placed a metre from the side walls and 80 cm from the front wall. They were driven by 130-Watt Quiescent T100MPA monoblocks, with a Grimm MU1 streamer and Origin Live Sovereign S turntable via a Mola Mola Tambaqui DAC and Mola Mola Lupe phono stage as sources. An icOn4PRO Balanced line stage did switching and attenuation duties.

There’s something about the sound of the F702SPs that is immediately and then enduringly appealing. They deliver an arrestingly high level of dynamic expression and combine it with similarly top-drawer imaging coherence to generate that almost tactile sense of performer presence that marks out a well-performing speaker from an also-ran.

Dynamic expression

Dr Mills is clearly among a relatively small cohort of speaker designers who understand that dynamic expression or power enables an audio system to persuade the human brain to buy into the illusion of live sound. The F702SPs initially come across as forward in the midrange, but on longer listening, it becomes clear that psychoacoustics are playing tricks. They are actually forward everywhere, from the low end to the very top; we might notice the midrange first because that’s part of the audio band we are genetically programmed to focus on. What gives the F702SPs their sense of irrepressible drive and dynamics is not a midrange standing proud by several dBs, but a high level of energy transfer that leaves many of the alternatives around the price point sounding by comparison rather flat and matter-of-fact.

Extended listening sessions with the already run-in review samples confirmed that Dr. Mills’ handiwork leans towards delivering musical engagement and enjoyment rather than transcribing the final scintilla of analytical detail. That’s not to suggest that the choice is binary for anyone with £12,000 burning a hole in their pocket. The F702SPs achieve a level of transparency that I consider to be broadly competitive, but – and here it is again – that high order of energy transfer allows the F702SPs to sound both seductively musical, and also more efficient than Fyne Audio’s claim of a measured 92dB.

Back to bass-ics

No surprise that the F702SPs’ low-end extension, a claimed -6dB at 29Hz, is flattered by the energy transfer. Bass tune playing is powerful, on its toes and well-textured, the floor-firing port making the speakers less fussy about placement than many front or rear-ported designs that require careful positioning if they are not to overly excite room nodes and sound boomy.

The concentric tweeter and midrange offer similarly strong refinement. As assessed subjectively in the domestic setting of the listening room, dispersion and the hand-over at 1.8kHz sounded even and seamless, while the combined drivers exhibited no hint of the ‘cuppiness’ or nasality that marrs some other designs of concentric transducers. Complex mixes of low and high frequencies, such as the highest notes of piano and piccolo, were dealt with in a way that was sweet and free of grain. Unlike the F1 Series, the F702SPs aren’t equipped with a potentiometer to attenuate or boost the HF delivery, but their performance during the review period attested to well-judged in-room delivery of HF energy and I didn’t find myself mourning the absence of a trim pot.

Given the concentric driver arrangement, the F702SPs should be able to create sonic images with a high degree of solidity and stability accompanied by a marked refinement in layering and depth perception. And so they did, their abilities in this aspect of sonic performance enhancing the experience of listening to most material. What might be regarded as simple fare like jazz trio recordings was delivered with appropriate apparent dimensions and intimacy, while grand soundscapes such as that painted by the Royal Concertgebouw Orchestra in its Decca recording of Messiaen’s Turangalila Symphony were given full measure. The F702SPs do scale with a capital S; they invited listeners to appreciate the sheer size of the resources under the control of conductor Riccardo Chailly, while with a low subjective level of masking distortion at the same time allowing individual performers, particularly in the unusually large percussion section, to be easily followed. The class-leading dynamic expression was the cherry on top of this orchestral cake, rendering Messiaen’s percussive crescendos with a very satisfying weight and power.

Iconoclasm

Despite ‘Marmite’ looks, Fyne Audio’s F1 Series of five speakers is a strong seller with an average of 500-600 pairs a year being delivered to customers, according to Maud. However, distributors and retailers worldwide have been saying that they could sell even more speakers if F1-type sonics could be clothed in a more widely appealing visual package. Maud says the F1 Series will continue to head the Fyne Audio product catalogue. Their looks may be unusual – iconoclastic even – but they are an easily identified and unmistakable design statement by the brand.

I lived with the F702SPs for too short a time; Fyne Audio wanted the demo pair back to feature them at the Bristol HiFi Show. It was time enough, though, to form an appreciation of their uncommon blend of lively and winningly musical performance and handsome looks. The F702SPs will surely prove that Fyne Audio’s play on F1-type performance in a more conventional cabinet is firmly aligned with customer sentiment. 

Technical specifications

• System Type: 2 ½ way
• Recommended amplifier power (Watt RMS): 30 – 200
• Peak power handling (Watt): 400
• Continuous power handling (Watt RMS): 100
• Sensitivity (2.83 Volt @ 1m): 92dB
• Nominal impedance: 8 Ohm
• Frequency response (-6dB typical in room): 28Hz – 34kHz
• Drive unit complement:
• 1 x 200mm IsoFlare™ point source driver, multi-fibre bass / midrange cone, FyneFlute™ surround with 25mm magnesium dome compression tweeter, ferrite magnet system. 
• 1 x 200mm multi-fibre bass / midrange cone, FyneFlute™ surround.
• Crossover frequency: 250Hz & 1.8kHz
• Crossover type: Bi-wired passive low loss, 2nd order low pass, 1st order high pass cryogenically treated.
• Dimensions – HxWxD: 1126 x 439 x 443mm (44.3 x 17.3 x 17.4”)
• Weight – Each: 37.5kg (82.7lbs)
• Finishes: Natural Walnut / Piano Gloss Walnut / Piano Gloss Black / Piano Gloss White
• Price: £12,000 per pair US$ price to be confirmed

Manufacturer/distributor

Fyne Audio

www.fyneaudio.com

+44(0)141 428 4008

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